“I felt good, I just had a lot of things going on,” he said of his 2021 campaign. “The fight I lost, then not making weight, and then my opponent backed out, and then finding out I was gonna be fighting this guy on Wednesday. It was a whole different game plan. I was getting ready to fight a left-handed guy who’s a striker, and then I pretty much end up fighting a real good wrestler. But it was good.”
Replacing Aaron Phillips, the unbeaten Lazishvili entered the Octagon known for his grappling, but he decided to trade with Martinez, a development that surprised the LA native slightly.
“Just a little bit because everybody knows I throw a lot of knees and stuff, so they think about it twice when it comes to shooting in.”
The game plan didn’t work for Lazishvili, but it was just fine for Martinez, who left the UFC APEX with a win via scores of 30-27, 29-28, 29-28. Even better, after several months in camp with the Factory X squad in Colorado, Martinez got to go home.
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“My leg’s pretty jacked up, so I’m just relaxing at home,” he said after the bout. “I’ve pretty much been in Colorado for three, four months and I haven’t been home with the family, so it feels good to be home.”